My Dear Idiot
by Authoressinhiding
Summary: Despite all the congratulations he has received since his engagement, Horatio struggles with doubt. If only Archie were there. He would have known what to say. In other words: One time that Horatio wished that Archie was still there for him. And one time when he actually was.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** It's that time of year again, when Horatio plays on my mind. Not intended as slash, but I suppose if you squint hard enough.

 **Disclaimer:** All characters mentioned herein belong entirely to C.S. Forester. I just borrowed them for a bit.

* * *

Horatio did not understand - he ought to have been happy. Maria was a very respectable woman. She was not unpleasant to look at, and she cared about him deeply. Why, then, could he not join the others - _any_ of the others? - in rejoicing in his good fortune? Why did he feel nothing more than cold regret and a chill deep in his bones?

This, like so much else, Horatio reflected, belonged in that unfortunate category entitled, "What Would Have Been Different Had Archie Been Here." It was a rather large category, and although he tried to be careful about assigning the minutiae of his life to it, rather more fell beneath that heading than he was entirely comfortable with.

Life on the Hotspur itself might not have been much altered. Bush would still be his first lieutenant. Seniority on its own determined that, and Horatio had the greatest confidence in William. But Archie would have been second. Horatio's morning ascent to the quarterdeck would be marked with a flash from cheerful blue eyes and a merry "Captain Hornblower" that would never have failed to raise his spirits. And in the company of his two real friends, Horatio would have known himself to be the happiest of men.

What Archie would have said on this current circumstance, Horatio had no concrete conclusions. Sitting alone in his cabin on the Hotspur, carefully peering over his next set of orders, however, he could imagine a little of how it would have been, had Archie lived.

He would have joined in the cheerful huzzah's along with the men and Mr. Bush. While perhaps not as enthusiastic as Styles and Matthews, his happiness for his Captain would have been as undeniable. But then, later, when all the hubbub had died down and Horatio had excused himself to his cabin to, well, think things over, there would have been a soft knock on his door.

"Come in," Horatio would say, and in would walk Archie.

They would have exchanged a few brief pleasantries, their conversation slowly circling around to its inevitable subject. Eventually, the change would be signaled by Archie's, "Permission to speak freely, sir?" to which Horatio would instinctively reply, "Of course."

As to the next part, Horatio was in two minds as to how it would happen. If there were a convenient chair, Archie would settle himself into it and then drag it close to Horatio's desk, the legs scraping horribly against the wooden planking. If no chair was at hand, Archie would simply move aside the least important looking of Horatio's paperwork and seat himself on the desk instead.

Horatio would look up into that honest face, its usual cheer contained and somewhat dimmed by purpose. He would meet those blue eyes that somehow seemed to always see directly through any of his pretenses. At times, it was plain to Horatio that Archie knew him better than he knew himself. He knew all the dark secrets that William knew - including the occasional bouts of nausea before an engagement - as well as the ones that even Horatio had half-forgotten.

"It is well known," he would begin, his tone filled with the patience of ages, "at least to those who read the naval chronicles, that no chains can hold Captain Horatio Hornblower for long. The Spaniards, the French, the rebel slaves of Santo Domingo - all have sought to imprison him and prevent him from fulfilling his duty to God, England, and St. George. And yet, despite all their efforts, none of them has ever proved successful – perhaps because they find him to be excessively troublesome."

Now he would lean forward, one arm casually resting upon his knee, supporting his weight with his elbow, and those blue eyes would pierce Horatio with an all-seeing directness that could only have been learned firsthand from Admiral Pellew himself.

"Tell me," he would continue, giving Horatio the room to explain himself, "how is it then, my dear idiot, that the great Captain Hornblower has been captured at last, trapped by a woman such as Maria Mason?"

Bit by bit, with a nearly bottomless patience and with an infinite supply of jests, he would draw out the truth of the matter. Whatever that truth was. And slowly, Horatio would grow to understand what mad impulse had driven him to propose to Maria then and why his conscience was wracked about it now.

When Horatio understood himself, when he could at last breathe and relax the knots paralyzing his stomach, Archie would alight from his perch on chair or desk with a final jest that could not fail to provoke his friend into a laugh. He would depart as easily as he had come, bound for the sunlit deck and the first dog watch, leaving behind a captain at peace enough with himself to properly focus on the latest orders from the admiralty.

So it would have been, had Archie lived. Had Archie lived, Horatio might never have found himself in such a situation, engaged to a woman he hardly knew and, worse, who hardly knew him.

As it was, Horatio was left to sort out his own knots and struggle against the incessant questionings of his conscience. _Why_ had he proposed to Maria Mason? What mad spirit had taken hold of him? Horatio pondered, and he debated, and at one point he almost stewed, but in the end, he could not uncover a satisfactory answer. He had done this, and he would have to make the best of it.

He stared down at the orders in front of him, attempting to think only of the instructions they contained. He reviewed plans and maps until his eyes nearly blurred. All the while, deep in the back of his mind, flickered the desperate, oft-repeated wish, that perhaps for just this one time, the rules of God and mortality and medicine would bend, just long enough for Archie to once again knock at his door.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N:** After a very long time, here comes the second chapter that I wasn't entirely sure I would ever get around to writing. Let me know what you think? :)

* * *

There was nothing to it, really. Nothing more than an urgent desire to mold the world to his whims, an urgent desire for the world to be anything other than what it was. An urgent desire to – if it were possible – turn back the clock, rewrite the universe, to right those unspeakable wrongs that went so far beyond his power to alter them. To alter the course of human events to suit his sensibilities, to suit his expediency, to suit . . . his wishes.

It was a foolish wish, a foolish dream, and yet Horatio found it all-consuming. He could not close his eyes without seeing Mariette's gasp of shock as her head jerked back in agony, without feeling her dropping out of his arms into the hot dust of the bridge. He could not breathe without the tang of sea air and the stale reek of unwashed bodies being replaced by acrid gunpowder, sharp sweat, and blood - coppery, metallic, and relentlessly unforgiving.

She was everywhere he went. Behind him or beside him; stumbling through the sand in the retreat to the beach; crouched in the gunwales of the Indy's longboat; scrambling hand over hand up the rope ladder along the frigate's side; being welcomed, bleary-eyed and weary, by Mr. Bracegirdle; waiting on the decks, not speaking to anyone, for his turn in the long line of officers reporting to Captain Pellew and even in the captain's cabin, where Horatio stood with his feet shoulder-width apart, his hands clasped behind his back and resting just above his tailbone, shoulders squared, chin up, eyes forward, as he related the entire awful tale to his commanding officer.

It had been a mistake. For politics or for achievement, or to merely appear as if His Most Britannic Royal Majesty was solidly on the side of the Imperialists (even in despair, Horatio was quick enough to appreciate the optics of the situation). If King George did not stand up for monarchies everywhere, some adventurous republican might take that as a hint that rebellion and uprising would not be repaid in blood. Better to make a valiant show of the heavy consequences that followed deposing a king than to allow upstarts and ambitious young men to believe that such things could be done carte blanche. Especially now, when the secession of the colonies lingered like a malingering wound in the back of men's minds.

And yet, despite logic, despite the hints of clear-sighted pragmatism that lingered at the back of his mind, despite the sting of the word "republican" bringing to mind that damned mad Marquis, stuffed into a military uniform that he lacked the honor to wear, that he never should have been allowed to wear, that ought to have been stripped from him by his commanding officers long before the people took the stripping into their own hands - despite all of this, Horatio knew with blackened, dismal certainty that this whole affair had been a mistake.

The French people had not needed their intervention, for cruel, archaic Imperialist troops to restore an order that they themselves had abandoned. Even their children were singing the Marseillaise, and there was no place in the village for the old order. Much less a space for the British soldiers and sailors come to aid in that restoration.

Overcome with emotion, Horatio had not been able to keep his inner thoughts from keeping to the fore, even as he fought to maintain steadiness of voice and neutrality of tone. The rebellious tears had been quick to follow the rebellious thoughts, and to his everlasting horror, he had found himself weeping in front of Captain Pellew.

All things considered, it had not been an utterly terrible interview. The captain had been surprisingly understanding, although the gentleness with which he approached the entire incident, with which he alluded to whatever Lord Edrington and Kennedy had told him had been the most surprising part of all. Finally, when Horatio did not think he could endure another moment of attempting to maintain a professional façade, he was dismissed.

The lieutenant hastened aft, hat in hand, until he reached the officers' mess and the little cabin that was his. He left the hat atop his sea chest and hurried out of the mess before anyone could speak to him. He did not think he could properly respond to Bracegirdle's cheery relief or hear of Mr. Bowles' truly extraordinary exploits, not at this moment, and he truly dreaded having to meet Lord Edrington's all-too-knowing expression for even an instant. It was all too much, and it was all too fresh.

Horatio returned to the main deck and glanced upwards at the mainmast. The sky was clear, blue and peaceful. He thought to himself that the earth and the sea bore witness to the tragedies of man, but remarked them no more than a king embarks the doings of a peasant. Until that peasant beheads the king, his unhelpful thoughts pointed out.

Grimacing, he approached the net of ropes leading upwards and eventually up, up, up to the crow's nest. He had no responsibilities until the next watch in two hours' time, and he felt the need to be somewhere else, anywhere else, and to feel something – _anything_ else. Even the nausea and head-swimmingness of being aloft would be preferable to this.

He ascended quickly, hand over hand, pausing at the lowest yardarm. After scooting out along the ratlines, he threw one leg over the side to straddle the thick oaken spar. Horatio leaned his back against the mast. If he chose, he could ascend higher, but this was far enough for now.

Horatio was able to enjoy the peace of solitude for less than ten minutes before a familiar golden head poked up on the other side of the mast, and Midshipman Kennedy scrambled up onto the far side of the spar to join him.

"There you are," said Archie, his tone pleasant, his blue eyes bright with exercise. He looked ahead to the prow of the Indefatigable. "Mister Bracegirdle was asking after you."

Horatio continued staring far ahead at the glittering water that surrounded them. "Was it urgent?" he asked, attempting to keep his voice neutral. He had hoped for more solace than this.

"No," replied the other man quietly. "It will keep." He paused. "Did you report to Pellew?"

Horatio nodded once. "As did you," he observed, his tone heavy.

Archie said nothing to this. He swung his legs back and forth easily, the soles of his black buckled shoes tapping against the ratlines.

They sat in silence for a several minutes, years of friendship sitting comfortably between them. To Horatio's gratitude and relief, he found that Archie had come not to ruin his quiet but to join it. He watched the ocean before them, feeling his knotted stomach slowly beginning to unclench. "Archie," he said at length, after the ship's bell rang out the next half hour.

The blond midshipman's head swiveled around to face him. "Yes, Horatio?"

"I . . . I have been remiss. I have yet to thank you. Earlier at the bridge. But for your bravery, I . . . I would likely be dead."

He glanced into his fellow officer's face. Archie was watching him with a bit of concern, but that concern was far outpaced by the warmth of deep friendship contained in his gaze. It was a gaze of mourning shared, of great understanding without judgement. Horatio looked back to the sea, almost uncomfortable with the sheer knowledge in his friend's blue eyes.

"My dear idiot," said Archie gently. He exhaled and shifted his weight on the yardarm so that he, too, was looking forwards once more. "You did not leave me," he explained patiently, having no need for further words to explain that he was referring to their time as enforced guests of the Dons. "I could not leave you."

Fresh tears burned at the backs of Horatio's eyes. He did not reply, and once again the two men sat together without speaking.

After a long moment, Archie cleared his throat. "Come," he said, swinging his leg back over the yard arm. "Let us go higher."

Throat tight, Horatio nodded and, following his friend, began the climb.

 _Fin._


End file.
